Prosecutors say R Kelly has history of intimidating victims, which is why he shouldn’t get bail

As R Kelly continues to try to secure bail while he waits for two criminal prosecutions to get to trial, The Blast has published extracts of court documents arguing that the musician has a history of threatening and intimidating his victims. This, prosecutors say, is a key reason why Kelly should remain in jail as the criminal cases against him go through the motions.

Kelly, of course, is accused of sexually abusing numerous
women, including underage girls. Such allegations have been made against
the star for years, but new criminal prosecutions were launched after
the airing of the ‘Surviving R Kelly’ documentary earlier this year. He
has been incarcerated since being arrested in July in relation to federal charges in New York.

Prosecutors have argued against granting Kelly bail on the
basis that he is a flight risk and that he poses a threat if allowed out
of jail. He strongly denies both of those claims.

In the court documents obtained by The Blast, the prosecution
set out in some detail what they mean about Kelly posing a threat if
granted bail. They argue that the star has a long history of trying to
silence his victims through blackmail or by threatening them or their
families. The blackmail usually centres on threats to leak explicit
photos or embarrassing letters Kelly allegedly forces his victims to
write.

Among other allegations, the court documents claim that Kelly,
“sent a typewritten letter to a lawyer then representing Jane Doe #5,
threatening to release compromising and potentially embarrassing
photographs of Jane Doe #5 if she pursued her civil lawsuit against the
defendant. The letter sent, which was provided to the defence as part of
the government’s discovery, includes certain photographs and screen
shots of text message exchanges between the defendant and Jane Doe #5
taken from the defendant’s phone”.

Noting that Kelly’s lawyers have previously stated that their
client is illiterate, the court filing goes on: “The defendant cannot
credibly deny his role in intimidating witnesses by claiming,
self-servingly, that he could not have written the letter due to his
allegedly limited reading and writing skills where he provided the
material used to make the threats and signed his name to the
accompanying documents”.

Prosecutors also allege that they have spoken to “multiple
women” who claim that the musician “has a history of coercing women to
write letters containing false and embarrassing allegations, so that the
defendant could use those letters as blackmail”.

To date, judges overseeing the two separate criminal cases have
been pretty consistent in denying Kelly bail. The allegations contained
in these court documents may well have been one of the reasons for the
judges taking that consistent viewpoint.